Rubi Badon
Paul Ovenden wasn’t someone who was well known outside the corridors of Westminster. But as the Government’s director of strategy – and a key ally of Keir Starmer’s all-powerful chief of staff Morgan McSweeney – the resignation of the influential and well respected aide underlines what ministers have been telling me all week: Downing Street is falling apart, and the Prime Minister’s authority is completely collapsing.
The messages which led to Ovenden’s resignation, and which related to Labour MP Diane Abbott, were graphic. But they were clearly humorous. They were eight years old, and sent as part of a private communication with a work colleague. And at any other time they would have been dismissed with a rap across the knuckles.
The fact that Starmer felt the need to throw Ovenden overboard – or at least stand back and let him throw himself overboard – has created fury among other senior government advisers.
‘You can tell all you need to know about a leader from who and what they fight for, one said. ‘The Prime Minister should have taken one look at one of his most skilful and loyal aides and torn up the resignation.’
Others have turned their guns on the Labour Left, who they believe are responsible for leaking the correspondence. ‘I’m disgusted. It shows there are people in the party, including MPs, who just don’t want us to be in Government. There’s a special place in hell for them’, one official raged.
But what Ovenden’s former colleagues think isn’t really the point.
What’s significant is what it reveals about Sir Keir’s thought process. And it’s clear the Prime Minister believes he is now too weak to stand up to his own party’s outrage at the perceived slight to a beloved party grandee.
It’s also a reflection of the dysfunctionality that is currently tearing out the heart of Starmer’s No.10 operation, as his remaining advisers flail around in a futile – and increasingly farcical – attempt to seize control of the Peter Mandelson saga. A few minutes after Ovenden’s resignation was announced, Starmer made an appearance to utter a few words on the crisis surrounding his former US ambassador and the emails he exchanged with paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein. And he embarrassed himself.
He was aware before he stood up in PMQs on Wednesday that new email revelations were pending, he admitted. He knew the Foreign Office was mounting an investigation into them, he further conceded.
But when he gave his ambassador his unequivocal confidence in the House of Commons chamber, he was not fully aware of what those revelations were, he claimed.
Given Downing Street already had full details of the offending e-mails, how could he have been so ignorant, he was asked. His response – incredibly – was that there was a time difference with the United States, and he had not yet had an opportunity to question Mandelson about his conduct.
It was also a response that was directly contradicted by a briefing given earlier in the day.
In a statement to lobby journalists, Starmer’s official spokesman claimed the Prime Minister was aware the Foreign Office was actively investigating the fresh emails, which they held in their possession. But Sir Keir didn’t know, or inquire, about their content before he addressed MPs.
So what Keir Starmer is asking the country to believe is that his most influential ambassador, responsible for managing the nation’s most important strategic alliance, became embroiled in a scandal involving the globe’s most infamous paedophile, less than a week before the most important state visit by a US President in living memory.
And the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom didn’t bother to check the details of what that scandal was before telling MPs the ambassador had his full confidence. Because it was past the 9.00pm watershed in Washington DC.
It’s utterly preposterous. Actually, it’s insulting. Starmer is playing the people of Britain for fools.
And Ovenden’s resignation yesterday is indicative of what happens when a Government begins to implode. One MP I spoke to told me they believed Starmer’s Manic Monday would inevitably lead to the departure of his most senior adviser McSweeney. ‘Now Ovenden’s gone he’s isolated. It’s only a matter of time. And when he does it’s over for Keir.’
A couple of others claimed it may actually stiffen the Prime Minister’s resolve to keep him. ‘With Ovenden gone he can’t afford to dump Morgan now,’ one said. ‘If he does that, he’s got no friends left.’
But either way, it further highlights Sir Keir’s fundamental flaw. He is a construct. A cypher. A figment of his advisers’ political imagination.
And without them to guide him, he is utterly lost. Actually, as the events of the past couple of weeks have shown, he’s lost with them. It’s only a matter of time. One of the Prime Minister’s closes allies has fallen. Precious few remain.
The question is now: Who gets to Keir Starmer first – his party, or the voters?
Source: Dailymail.co.uk | Read the Full Story…
